Looking Forwards, Seeing Backwards
by Fatuous One
Summary: Anko finds herself taken off active duty due to her connection with Orochimaru. Frustrated and powerless to get past the politics of her situation, she might yet find an answer to her dilemma, and in the most unlikely of places.


Disclaimer: All rights of ownership of "Naruto" and its characters belong to Kishimoto Masashi and other affiliated companies such as Shueisha, VIZ Media, Studio Pierrot and Aniplex. This is purely a work of fiction made by fans, for fans. If any of the respective owners ask, I will remove all content that I do not hold any rights to (meaning, by proxy, the whole story). 

Warning: The author is an untalented, toneless hack. Contents may cause you to scream "OMGWTF? DO NOT WANT. GTFO!" and throw your fist into your computer screen in a fit of rage.

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Begin - Looking Forwards, Seeing Backwards 

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_First Scroll – __Henge: Deception through disguise_

"Decrepit old fuckers… nasty old bags of horse shit… wrinkled pricks and soppy cunts, the lot of 'em!"

The string of foul curses drew quite a few stares, and if Anko had been in a proper state of mind, she might have made better use of the attention. As it was, her mood was dark enough that she only paid half a mind to her mouth and the nervous glances it brought. Her thoughts were focused solely on her meal. Her teeth dug savagely into the dango as she imagined that instead of the sticky dumplings, it was the faces of the Konoha council. Similarly, she greedily drank her sake, wishing that she tasted the metallic flavor of blood instead of the thick alcoholic tang of her rice wine.

The council…

Anko's mutters tapered off as she heaved a sigh, and the patrons of the bar she was in started to nervously settle back in.

It wasn't that she had any real problem with the old geezers, not really. However, they really seemed to have one with her. Ever since her training under Orochimaru, and his betrayal of the Leaf, she had always been cast a suspicious glare. Subsequently, she had never officially been promoted from chuunin, as all the examiners hadn't really trusted her in a higher position. Troubling… but due to the Third's intervention, she had been able to be ranked as a special-jounin, not quite as high a ninja as a normal jounin, but still better then chuunin.

Of course, with the Third's death…

Anko sighed again as she stared pensively at her empty sake saucer. A short time after the Third's demise, when the chaos had started to die down, the council of old men and women that helped govern much of the Leaf had finally decided to deal with a problematic special-jounin. Oh, it wasn't that she had been removed from her job, or demoted, but she had been given… vacation time. In actuality, she had been pulled off active duty, and forcefully placed on paid leave. What was worse was that the Leaf desperately needed all the forces it could gather, but did the council actually use all its available resources? Nooo… That would require that them to actually have half a brain between them.

Absently chugging her sake, Anko brought down the ceramic onto the table forcefully, her anger renewed. The noise caused many of the other occupants to jump, their state of relaxation shattered once more.

Growling with frustration, Anko threw a small bundle of ryou onto the counter and left. She wasn't completely sure that the money covered her bill but… bah! She didn't give a flying fuck anyway, the place's dango sucked.

Sticking her hands into the pockets of her beige jacket, Anko stalked out onto the streets, not really paying any attention to her destination.

It wasn't that she really cared all that much about being stuck without a job. With the 'vacation' time, she could actually travel out of Konoha all she wanted, and she didn't have to scrap for any odd jobs to pay the rent, she had enough saved up to last a year or more.

But… but…

"Argghh!" Anko suddenly screamed and clutched her head with both hands, drawing dozens of startled stares. "I'm so fucking bored!" Anko bemoaned as she rubbed her head vigorously, causing her hair to swing around wildly.

She wouldn't be able to find many jobs outside of the Leaf that actually were any fun. The most she might scrape together would be some bodyguard job that would possibly end with some bandits attacking. But even that was unlikely with all the various powers gathering strength for the upcoming war. Although only the Sound and the Leaf were really butting heads, nobody wanted to be caught with their pants down if another country decided to take advantage of the mayhem and launch an attack. Thus, most patrols were being tightened, and any missing-nin or ronin were going to keep a low profile to try to and stay under the villages' radar.

And as the Leaf was gearing up, she couldn't cause any chaos within the village without some serious repercussions. No thank you, Anko liked her rank, even if it wasn't as high as she would have wished.

All the action was in Konoha, and Anko was barred from any activities. It was maddening! Anko had gone through many different scenarios on trying to get in on the war, ranging from visiting the Hokage behind the council's back (which she discarded because she didn't believe the Fifth would be any more sympathetic to her cause), to brutally murdering the council in bloody ways (which, although tempting, wouldn't really help her plight as the paid leave was already through the system. Plus, while the killing the old bastards would be satisfying, she wasn't about to chance going up against any ANBU).

So, in a nutshell, Anko was fucked. Deeply and royally screwed.

"I'm fucked." Anko pointed out to the world.

Her mood darkening by the second, the bloodthirsty ninja twisted around a corner of the nearly empty street (her foul murmurs caused many people to take different routes) and ran straight into another person. Normally, this wouldn't have bothered Anko, and normally she would have simply rolled with it instead of falling on her ass, but this wasn't Anko in a normal mood. Thus, when Anko leapt back on her feet, she started ripping the target of her venom a new asshole, verbally anyway.

"Watch where you're going, you little shit!" Anko absently noticed the woman flinch, "If you don't look out, you might just run into someone real… dangerous, and piss them off" To emphasize this point, Anko pulled out one of her kunai.

Anko would have continued on this tangent, likely ending with the kunai nicking the other person, and her licking that yummy liquid off. However, now that Anko actually looked at her target, and saw her trembling, it caused her rant to trail off and really take more then a glance.

After a few moments of silence - mostly silence, if you listened really hard, you might have heard the beginnings of some stuttered apologies - Anko connected the face to a name, or rather the eyes to a name.

"You're a Hyuuga, ain't cha?" Anko questioned curiously, the wide silvery eyes, devoid of pupils, giving the answer away. Nevertheless, the young girl opposite of the special-jounin nodded woodenly, still frozen with fright.

Taking a few more seconds, Anko searched her brain for the girl's name, Hinona? Hinita, Hinato, Hinata… Yes, Hinata. She was the girl that got her ass handed to her on a platter by the other Hyuuga, Neju or something. Anko had to hand it to the girl; she was quite tenacious. Although, you wouldn't know it from the black-haired genin's petrified look. Also, if Anko remembered right, the girl's team had finished second in her exam, not bad considering the first one had been that Sand boy's team.

Hmm… How to have some fun with this?

---

It simply wasn't a good day, at least in Hinata's case. She briefly wondered if she should have even bothered getting up in the morning, but no, she was a Hyuuga, and thus had certain responsibilities… like getting out of bed, couldn't be caught snoozing into the afternoon after all.

The day wasn't bad in the sense that she got anything worse from her father, because well, how could you be extra ignored? But when her sister had decided to get some practice from her elder sister, as her father was busy training their cousin… Well, Hinata thought the chakra burns would heal within a day or so. That isn't to say that Hanabi was better then Hinata in skill, in actuality, Hinata's sister was probably slightly lesser in ability, but the level of conviction in battle… Every time she saw an opening in her younger sister's defense, she hesitated. Any attack she made, she had a small hitch, and Hanabi took advantage of this glaring weakness.

Well, the training with her sister wasn't terrible, the duel stopped before long. However, things began to sour from that point. While finding that her sensei, Kurenai, was being bogged down with missions and couldn't organize any team meetings wasn't a shock, it was a disappointment. Of course, Hinata had considered going to the team meet anyway, but neither Kiba nor Shino would have showed, as they both had found some teachers: their relatives. Thus, Hinata was left without any teammates, and felt significantly lacking without them when training. Added onto that, it turned out that Hanabi was trying to copy Neji, as Hinata found her chakra system slightly out of whack when she started to train. Hinata really didn't want to know if premature testing with the Sixty-four Point Hands technique had any bad side effects.

Mildly disheartened and slightly weary, Hinata had taken a short break for lunch, when she had run into **_this_** person. One might not typically be instantly afraid of Anko, even if she was cursing you to hell, but Hinata had sudden flashbacks to when the woman threw a kunai at Naruto in the Chuunin exam, and then **_licked_** the blood off his cheek. While Hinata didn't have any real problems with blood, she was greatly disturbed by the examiner's attitude. And to incite her wrath on an already unpleasant day… What rotten luck.

"You're a Hyuuga, ain't cha?" The question brought Hinata out of her stupor, and she nodded stiffly. While the woman frightened the pale heiress to a high degree, she had been taught that politeness had its values, even to 'such people.'

"Um…" Hinata began, hoping to quickly apologize and leave the scary woman's presence.

"Huh," Anko grunted, interrupting Hinata. "Hinata, right?" Anko asked, then continued without waiting for confirmation. "Well, I think we need to do something about your attitude." The words brought a flood of indignation that Hinata immediately beat back down.

"…" Hinata grasped for something to say to the smirking woman, but could only gasp out half formed syllables. Once again, without really waiting for an answer, Anko grabbed Hinata's hand in a viselike grip, and then began to barrel away with the poor girl, destination unknown.

Keeping up with the black-haired special-jounin wasn't easy. Whenever Hinata stumbled slightly or tripped, her arm felt like it was being ripped out of its socket, as Anko didn't slow in her sprinting. Her grip was also uncomfortable tight; Hinata could feel the nerves in her hand numbing as the blood circulation was blocked.

It seemed to take hours, from almost running into a surprised pedestrian, to taking a sharp curve into an alley a shortcut, Hinata briefly wished she could hack off her own arm to get away. Eventually however, the young Hyuuga found herself out of the village shopping district and into one of its training zones. A very familiar training ground actually.

"This…" Hinata paused as she drew several deep breaths, only now realizing how much the dash had taken out of her. Foolish really, as a ninja, she should have used some chakra to boost her stamina. "This is… my team's training zone…" Hinata's comment caused Anko to glance at her sharply, slightly startled by the revelation.

"Eh," Anko waved off her own unease, "well, that's good then." So what if this was her team's training ground when she was a genin?

"Now!" Anko barked as she pointed a finger at Hinata menacingly, causing the girl to jump. "Time for your… training." The way she said the word 'training' seemed to pronounce something entirely different then what Hinata would normally envision. 'Torture' or 'bloody slaughter' would probably fit the tone better in Hinata's book.

It was all she could do to hold back a whimper.

---

Anko was impressed.

It wasn't the fact that the girl was really good or anything. In actuality, her skills were somewhat sub-par compared to many other genins currently on the roster. Her attitude wasn't even particularly good, far too much of a defeatist. But it was… the spark. Hinata honestly wanted to become stronger. She didn't want to be a good ninja, she didn't want to be acknowledged, and she didn't have any sort of grand 'dream' she wanted to live. She simply wanted to become stronger, a stronger warrior, a stronger ally, a stronger individual. Granted, those other things would sure be nice… but they weren't her heart's desire.

Anko knew all this, simply by the beat of her palms, the glint of her eyes, the gasps of her lungs. Perhaps she was reading the girl wrong, but she didn't think so.

Breaking out of her revere, Anko tilted her head to the side, avoiding both Hinata's strike and the invisible wave of deadly chakra that preceded it. The scantily clad ninja noticed that the attack was extremely slow compared to the younger girl's previous blows. Considering how long the fight had been going, the Hyuuga was probably at her limit.

"Alrighty," Anko said brightly, halting their session. "That's enough of that," Hinata collapsed accordingly, "for now anyway." Anko smirked as she heard the pale genin's groan of exhaustion.

Whistling cheerfully, Anko turned away from the tired ninja girl, dusted off her untouched clothing, and then began to walk away

"W-wait…" The black-haired special-jounin paused and turned her head at the other girl's voice. "Yeah?" Her voice now slightly grumpy sounding, she wanted dango, damn it. "T-thank you…" The Hyuuga heiress grimaced as she flexed a sore muscle. "Thank you, Mitarashi-san." Anko raised a curious eyebrow; she hadn't expected that, given how much of a beating had been laid on the girl.

"Yeah," Anko smirked slightly, "No problem."

Walking away, Anko's smirk widened as she heard a tiny thud accompanied by a small groan of pain as the young girl tried, and obviously failed, to fully lift herself off the dirt.

---

"Ahh… Fuck…" Anko swore as she stretched some kinks. She most definitely wasn't a morning person. While the workout with the Hyuuga girl wasn't difficult, the smashing she had after had been.

"Man… I don't remember the last time I was so shit-faced." Anko grumped as she used a bit of her chakra to clear her hangover, a small trick she had picked up from her tutelage under Orochimaru. There were certainly advantages to getting trained by a man completely obsessed with learning every kind of technique available, even the mostly useless ones. Anko shook her head, bemused as she recalled the skills that her former teacher had picked up. Really, what use was a skill that made soapy water instead of clean?

Although her sensei had argued that it could be useful in certain situations, the fact was that he had more useful skills involving tainted water techniques in his arsenal.

"Cheap bastard was probably just teaching me that useless stuff so he could go back to his butchering." Anko mumbled, a macabre mood starting to settle in. Quickly finishing her stretching, Anko brushed her teeth at light speed and zipped out of her apartment, she had better things to do then to go all broody about the past.

Bouncing energetically, Anko skipped her way over to her favorite food stand, the one that was closed for repairs yesterday, forcing her to eat dango elsewhere. Of course, the whole reason the repairs were needed was that stupid fuckwad messenger had decided to inform her of the council's decision of her 'paid leave' while she was eating there. Didn't even get a chance to refuse it, or even become aware of it before it was passed. Those thoughts brought Anko's cheerful mood down a few notches, added to the fact that it might be difficult for the owner to forgive her for trashing his stand…

"Stupid old fuckers." Anko cursed as she arrived at Kazoku's. "Hey! Old man, wha'cha got for me?"

"I got a knife for your gut," A brown-haired middle-aged man, who went by the name of Kazoku, replied, although his tone belied any ill intent.

"Huh," Anko grunted as she sat onto nearby stool, "well, I'd rather have some dango, but if you'd like to try…" Anko spread her lips in a toothy, and vicious, smile.

"Eh," Kazoku huffed, before sliding a flimsy paper tray with four skewed rice cake dumplings over to her. "I hope ya' choke on 'em." He said before turning to another customer, one whom he was much more polite to.

Grinning infuriatingly, Anko quickly munched on her favorite food. Soon devouring all their dull sweet goodness, Anko repeatedly ordered more. The owner, knowing of Anko's antics, always had a new tray of dango for her to consume within her bottomless stomach. After emptying her wallet, Anko left the stand, completely content.

However, this good mood soon fled as she ran into someone she wasn't too keen on seeing, alive away.

"Homura-sama…" Anko grit her teeth, faking a bright smile. "How… nice to see you." Homura snorted.

"Don't play coy, Anko." Damn it, even his voice grated on her nerves. "I know you, at least somewhat well, you probably want to rip my guts out and hang with me them."

'Fucking right I do, old bastard.' Anko mental growled out, 'But before that I'd start taking you apart, piece-by-piece. First, I'd chop off your fingers, then cauterize the stubs, and then I'd slowly shove each one up your old wrinkly ass… then…'

"Of course not, Homura-sama" Anko said sweetly. 'I'd move onto your toes, hacking them off, before feeding them to you. After you had ten delicious meaty bits, I'd have some snakes gnaw the rest of your feet off up to your shins. None poisonous of course, wouldn't want you to succumb prematurely…'

Homura shook his head slowly, "Perhaps if you were more honest…" his voice trailed off, knowing that he wasn't helping matters.

'MORE HONEST?' Anko mentally screamed at the hypocrisy of the old man. 'I was completely honest at the beginning, and you assholes acknowledged that by throwing me in prison for a few months.' It wasn't technically a prison, but she was placed under house arrest, and considering she used to live at Orochimaru's household, she was transferred to a bare apartment that had far too much of a resemblance to a prison cell for her liking at the time.

"Why, Homura-sama, what ever do you mean?" Anko's tone was even more sickly sweet. At this point, a deaf man could have heard the malice oozing from her.

Once again Homura shook his head, almost pityingly. Before walking away with a brief farewell.

"Yeah, see ya, you old fucking bag of rotten flesh and maggoty bone marrow." Anko's ire grew in lengths and bounds as she stalked away, her rage even greater then the previous night.

Her dark mood only grew with her boredom. After a few minutes of simply pacing without a proper outlet, Anko was close to screaming in utter frustration.

"Fuck it," Anko growled, "I'm going to blow some shit up." And with that, Anko scaled a nearby building and hightailed it over to her old training grounds.

---

"Hya!" Hinata's open palm struck the log with a resounding whack. She felt the force of the blow smack into her, stinging, and travel up through her arm as part of a vibration.

"Hya!" Idly, she wondered if yelling like this was _really_ necessary. Granted, while doing so caused certain abdominal muscles to clench, and thus strengthening her blow, she could do the same by just consciously controlling the muscles themselves.

"…"

"Hya!" Nevertheless, she wasn't exactly an expert on hand-to-hand combat. This was the way she was taught, and unless she had a teacher to bounce ideas off of, one she was currently lacking, she would keep to the same routine, and hope.

"Hya! … Hya!" Sighing, Hinata dropped her stance and plopped down on the ground. It really was no use. She couldn't improve that way, she wasn't Rock Lee… she simply didn't have the motivation to do that to herself. She wasn't Neji, who could do things, just because he was _that_ good. She wasn't… she wasn't Naruto, who could do anything with pure will. Exhaling loudly, Hinata cupped her face with both hands; racking her brain for any sort of improvement she could make, and was coming up with a very discouraging **NOTHING**.

"Uh, you done?" Jumping at the unexpected voice, Hinata whipped around to see…

"Mitarashi-san?" Her voice was an odd mixture of curiosity and longing that surprised both of them. Anko looked slightly off balance at the tone, before looking at the shy girl with a bemused expression.

"Uh… yeah? You want somethin'?" Anko raised an eyebrow appropriately and Hinata blushed slightly.

"N-no!" Hinata half-stammered, half-shouted. Before quietly correcting herself, "I mean… yes." Anko's mouth curved slightly, amused. "B-but… I mean… I want…" Hinata trailed off uncertainly.

"Well," Anko said, starting to tire of the girl's stuttering. "What do you want? Com'on, spit it out."

"I… I mean…" Hinata tried again, "Perhaps… we could spar… again, if you wouldn't mind?"

That surprised Anko. She blinked several times, before staring pointedly at Hinata, reevaluating her. While she had a small amount of respect for the kid's tenacity, she hadn't expected her to go asking for another beat down. Granted, her 'spar' with her the day before hadn't done any real damage, but the girl would have been feeling it for hours afterward, she was likely still aching.

Anko's main hand-to-hand style was focused on pain; she learned a great deal of pressure point knowledge from her old teacher, and from it she created a form of fighting that put the enemy in utter agony the longer they fought. Because, while ninja were trained to ignore pain, it was still a very big distraction, and caused many of her opponents to falter at key moments.

Well, that and Anko was a sadist. Which was the main reason she fought Hinata before, she had needed some relief, and watching the girl squirm in pain had been quite a turn on. Anko had been looking for a quick screw after that, and although she hadn't found anyone to her liking, a little help from a big cylindrically shaped friend had been quite satisfying… from what she could remember anyway.

Anko could see that her silence was causing the other girl a great deal of distress, and because she needed to get work off some anger anyway…

"Eh… Sure, why not." Shrugging her shoulders slightly, Anko gestured for Hinata to attack.

Flashing a brief smile, Hinata took up a defensive stance of her family's style of fighting. Anko's eyebrow rose up at that, the girl wasn't taking the initial attack, again. Granted, rushing in wasn't a bright idea, but not taking an offensive position at all wasn't too smart either. This girl needed to stop holding back.

Yanking a kunai out of its holster, Anko tossed it lazily towards the Hyuuga. Hinata's brow furrowed as she saw the projectile fall limply at her feet, before she noticed the small burning paper on it. Her eyes widened and she hurriedly kicked the explosive away.

Shaking her head slightly, Anko jumped from tree to tree in the forest area and starting setting minor traps while the girl was distracted. A few explosive tags here, a couple of wired-tripped kunai there… Smirking, Anko quickly threw another kunai at her reoriented opponent and chuckled lightly at the squeak the girl made as she dodged it, barely, and the loud noise of the tag on it going off.

This was so much fun!

It had been a while since Anko had fought an opponent like this, playing with them in a game of cat and mouse. While she enjoyed inflicting pain, it was mostly physical damage that she dealt. She wasn't stealthy enough that she could pull this type of thing off with an equal combatant, and she didn't really feel like too much of a bully since the girl had asked for it.

Watching her victim recover again from another exploding kunai, Anko felt her nipples harden as she saw the girl's panicked expression. Licking her lips excitedly, Anko bit into her thumb, drawing blood, before slapping it against the tree she stood on.

"Kuchiyose no Jutsu" Anko whispered as she calling out her favorite type of animal.

"Missstresss…" Rasped Hibibi, a low level summoned snake. Slithering his long body onto her arm, he tasted the air around his caller, shuddering slightly at the lovely smell of her excitement.

"Good morning," Anko said to the green-scaled serpent as he crawled into her clothing. "Wanna have some fun?" Her voice was slightly breathy in anticipation.

Hibibi hummed an affirmative as it crawled along and in-between her fishnet covered breasts, pausing slightly to squeeze them, causing Anko to moan appreciatively. He was very low level in the summon chain, and knew that he wouldn't likely be called for anything other then a training session or… well, mostly just training.

He hadn't yet earned his place among the snakes, and thus didn't have many of the properties of his kin, such as a deadly poison or giant size. Not to mention that there weren't many snake-users these days, something Hibibi bitterly thought of as Orochimaru's fault. Although he didn't have many battle talents, he had his uses, but only to lower level summoners. Hibibi knew that it was no coincidence that after Orochimaru betrayed his village many contracted ninjas were suddenly marked off the snake scroll. After which, he wasn't used all that much.

To many, this wasn't too great of a problem. Some, like the great Manda, even disliked being summoned frequently. But to ones such as Hibibi, it was practically damning. The entire reason creatures agreed to contracts in the first place was the exchange. The exchange was that in giving a small, or large depending, amount of energy and a sacrifice, the ninja would gain an ally in his battle. The energy and sacrifice would mostly go into bringing the summoned from its realm, but a bit of it went into the creature itself, strengthening it.

When Orochimaru killed the lesser snake-users, he basically screwed over any chance of Hibibi and others like him to gain a higher position in their circle. Thus, one might see why Orochimaru wasn't well liked among the weaker snakes. However, given that Orochimaru never used any of the weak ones, he probably wasn't even aware of his own infamy among them, let alone actually caring about it.

"Ah…" Anko groaned, before pulling the snake out from her fishnet and tossing it onto a lower branch. "Careful, the girl's a Hyuuga, she'll likely spot you unless she's distracted." Her warning caused the snake to pause in its descent down the tree. Thinking of how to get close to the girl without her noticing.

Given that the Hyuuga clan had that irritating eyesight, it seemed unlikely that he would be able to get close. But, although Hibibi was weak compared to his brothers, he had a trump card. This one ability was why Anko found him useful, and thus pretty much the only reason he got out at all. He could cloak himself to most chakra sensing. He could him emit a low concentration of vibrations around him, humming really. This caused the natural chakra that the air had in it to yield to around him and allow him to hide within that empty space. This was only possible because of his low level chakra though, if he had a large chakra system, like many of his betters, he wouldn't be able to hide within the gap because his power would cause too many 'ripples' in his movement. Still, with the Hyuuga, he would have to be extra careful. He didn't know if their eyes would be able to spot him.

"Huh…" Anko grunted, noticing that Hinata had finally found her. "Her field of vision… its better then that Neju kid's." Anko had distanced herself by three kilometers, one kilometer past the other Hyuuga's limit. When she heard about the boy, she had looked up all his specs in his GEAR file. All jounin instructors were required to post data about their genin while they were under their tutelage. The point of this was to evaluate their mental stability. If they showed signs of turning traitor, they were placed under a higher observation. Depending on the observer's report, they were cleared, sent for 'special' training, or in some extreme cases, executed.

Of course, the 'special' training didn't always turn out right. An example of this would be Uchiha Sasuke who, after being reported, had been 'trained' by Hatake Kakashi. In retrospect, it wasn't a bright idea for the brat's teacher to train him, Anko wasn't convinced that he actually did the proper brainwashing techniques, but there wasn't a rule against it.

Some of course, fell under the radar of these reports, but that would only be in some extreme cases, such as Uchiha Itachi and Orochimaru's betrayal respectively. Itachi had actually only been a genin for a short period of time before being promoted though, and Orochimaru had become legendary before the reports even existed. The Genin Evaluation of Activity Report it was called, and it was the reason the Leaf ranked among the lowest on the bracket of missing nins, the only ones lower being dinky little villages, like the Waterfall.

GEAR files could grow quite large, for as long as you were a genin, you were always under at least a small amount of observation. The reports were full of damning information though, and they were completely destroyed when the genin was promoted. They also required a rank of at least jounin to see them. Anko was very pleased that special-jounin still counted as jounin in cases like these.

Anko broke out of her musings as she heard several kunai whistling through the air towards her, seems her traps didn't deter her opponent much.

Snatching the two sharp projectiles, Anko immediately threw them by at their owner. The tags didn't last long enough to get to their new target though and exploded in midair. Anko smirked slightly into the smoke, that girl… had predicted her. The smoke was too dense to be from a normal tag; obviously Hinata was planning on taking advantage of her enhanced vision. Anko's radius of sight was tiny, whereas the Hyuuga girl likely had an almost perfect view.

Aware that standing in one place like a dolt wasn't going to be very productive, Anko decided to drop onto the ground, even if that was likely part of the girl's plan. Using a small amount of chakra, Anko caught at air particles and slowed her descent, hoping to grasp the area better. Unfortunately, Hinata had other ideas. Jumping from her perch, the Byakugan user fell towards her sparring partner with chakra bleeding from her deadly hands.

Quickly throwing the energy she used to slow herself in an angled direction, Anko dodged out of the way of the heiress' leaping attack. Anko tugged a kunai from her thigh holster and threw it at the other girl, before frowning slightly as she saw it get deflected.

"Mmm… pretty good, you found me." Anko complimented, '_Even though I wasn't really trying…'_

"…" Hinata's face expressed her concentration vividly as she stared at her sparring partner. Her stance was still defensive, but this was less from her innate emotions and more due to her wariness of her opponent.

"Well," A grin flashed Anko's face, "It's still game over, for you" Hinata's confusion showed, until she felt her a presence above her. Too late, the heiress prepared to defend against a volley of projectiles, and thus was unprepared for the enemy to fall right on top of her.

A flash of slimy green was all the visual warning Hinata had before the animal fell onto her shoulders and tightened its body in a ready position. A raspy voice whispered into her ear, "Sss…all?" Its tongue flicked into her earlobe, the tone laced with an air of… disappointment?

Great, even snakes were finding her wanting.

"Like I said," Anko's voice distracted her from her looming depressing, "Pretty good." The special-jounin walked leisurely over to the stilled Hyuuga, grasping her shoulder in a friendly gesture. "But, you made quite a few mistakes." Feeling the snake loosen itself from its tight embrace and slither onto the other woman's own arm, Hinata nodded shamefully.

"So," Anko's tone was completely neutral as she spoke, "Why did you lose?" Shaking her head slightly, Hinata wondered what she meant.

"What I mean is… what mistakes did you make? Why did you make them? How can you overcome them, not do them again?" Anko's even tone of voice didn't change, but she raised a single eyebrow in question.

"Um…" Hinata stuttered, a sudden case of nervousness caused her to point her forefingers together in habit. "I… don't know… I…" Hinata's thoughts spiraled downward as she panicked, 'I wasn't strong enough to beat a jounin… why she asking me such an obvious thing… I'm just too weak…'

"Che!" The scoff caused Hinata to wince, "Look…" Hinata bowed her head, unable to look as she was scolded. "Hey! Look at me!" Jumping nervously, Hinata hesitantly did as she was instructed. Expecting an annoyed and somewhat angry expression, the Hyuuga heiress was surprised to only see a bemused look on the other woman's face.

"I see that you haven't done any sort of review before, huh?" Anko's laugh was self-depreciating, "Sorry, didn't think I was the only ninja who got trained so meticulously." The soft 'poof' sound of the summoned snake disappearing, along with the laugh caused Hinata to lose her overwhelming panic and look at her sparring partner with confused eyes.

"Okay!" Anko clapped, startling Hinata once again, "Let's go over the battle, short that it was."

"The first mistake you made was when you gave up the advantage of first strike." Anko said in a bizarre lecturing tone. "When you did that, you left yourself open to attack." Hinata tilted her head, "But…" Her voice interrupted, "The academy instructors taught us to… to strike from the shadows, to not rush in headfirst." Anko waved her hand dismissively, "Yes, yes…But that's only when you actually have an equal or only slightly differentiating level in skill. When your opponent is at a much higher level of power then you, there is almost no possible way that you will be able to fool them with petty deception, like hiding within the foliage." Anko shrugged her shoulders, "Instinctively, you knew this, and thus you stood in one spot, defensive in your position." Anko stopped, before jabbing her finger in front of Hinata's face. "But! You let me, a special-jounin, someone who likely has a lot more tricks up her sleeve, take the first move… that was a mistake." Lowering her finger, Anko looked at Hinata solemnly. "It's only a good idea to be defensive against a stronger opponent if you're delaying for time. My own tactic of distracting you with simple explosive tags and kunai while I set up more traps is a good example of buying time." Hinata nodded to this mutely.

"You showed that you could also be very offensive, but you only did so after I had already set up a clear position in the battlefield. This allowed me to summon that snake that took you out, while you were busying avoiding my traps and finding me. Also," Anko paused again to look at Hinata seriously, "When you went on the attack, you were too focused on me, which left you completely open to my friend's attack." At this, Hinata mumbled something barely audible. "Mmm?" Anko leaned her head closer, "Speak up!"

"I… I usually see all my incoming opponents before they attack… I didn't expect your… um, your friend to get me like that…" Anko nodded at this. "It's true, Hibibi does have a tendency to sneak up on even the wary." Hinata felt slightly better at this, she wasn't a complete failure. "But that's no excuse!" That feeling died a horrible and bloody death. "Hibibi's skill is being able to blend somewhat well with the sort of 'background' noise of the world's natural energy. This works with most ninja, but as a user of the Byakugan, you should have easily been able to spot him." Hinata bowed her, her cheeks burning with embarrassment.

"On top of that," Anko's voice seemed like a hammer to Hinata, pounding what little pride in her abilities she had left. "While your usage of kunai and explosive tags was good, it was also glaringly obvious and incomplete. Even though you got me at close range again with your battle tactics, you didn't seem to really have any initial plan besides that. If you had given it a bit of thought, before you attacked you may have wanted to set up traps or some kind of field advantage in the battleground you set."

Anko shrugged at the girl's hunched form. "So, yeah," Her calmer voice shook Hinata out of her self-berating. "That's something you need to work on." Hinata's eyebrows rose in surprise, this wasn't quite what she was used to. "Um…" She felt so… stupid. "H-how…?" Hinata trailed off, her courage depleted.

"Hm?" Anko grunted as she leaned forward, raising Hianta's nervousness as the other woman's face loomed closer to her own with a disturbing look of scrutiny on it. "How… what?" Anko repeated, her eyes locked onto Hinata's. "H-how…" She stopped as she tried to regain control of her vocal cords. "How do I… work on it?"

Anko's face was blank for a moment, "Geeze!" She slapped her own forehead in exasperation. "How do you… oh for crying out…" Anko lid her hand down her face slowly, "Look," The special-jounin's voice had an air of disbelief to it. "Meet me here tomorrow, at around the same time I arrived here today, and I'll show you… 'kay?" Not waiting for an answer, Anko did an about-face and began to walk away.

"I… uh…" Hinata stood there spluttering for a few seconds, "O-okay…" She murmured to the empty training area.

Sighing, Hinata turned around as well and began to walk back to the Hyuuga ancestral home. While she wasn't as physically tried as yesterday, she felt like an entire army of Neji's had just smacked around her mind. Her emotions were taxed from all the surprises during and after her 'spar' with the special-jounin. On top of that, while she wasn't as drained as the previous day's workout, her muscles were screaming in protest, as they hadn't completely recovered from her last session. She felt more tried then she had in almost her entire life, barring life-and-death situations.

Hinata never felt better.

---

Before the sun even risen out of its shadow, a certain dark-haired special-jounin was awoken by the sounds of her blaring alarm. Quickly destroying the annoying piece of machinery, Anko rose from her bed like a zombie; she was most definitely not a morning person. It was speculated by her colleagues that she didn't completely wake up from a rest until she had feasted upon the flesh of at least three innocents. Said colleagues usually didn't say anything like that again, especially around her at morning time, unless they felt that they were innocent enough to be used in said sacrifice.

In actuality, Anko didn't feel completely awake until she had devoured _four_ innocents, innocent dango that is.

Blinking wearily, Anko opened her refrigerator and whipped out a stick of cold rice cake dumplings. Others would likely have been quite leery of eating cold dango, especially week old dango, but Anko, be it through stupidity or just a fanatical wanting of the desert, swiftly chomped down the round treats. Quickly chugging some milk, Anko bounded out of her apartment at top speeds towards the Hokage tower.

She had a plan! A plan that would, hopefully, relieve her of her all present boredom.

It had struck her during her walk home after her training session with the Hyuuga girl. Actually that wasn't it exactly, it hadn't really been a spar as she had first identified it as, but rather, it was _training_ the girl. Training, and Anko after reflecting on the evening, had realized that she had a lot of fun doing it. That had brought a shock. Her, Mitarashi Anko, had enjoyed training a little brat. It was amusing because she had turned down countless offers of becoming a jounin instructor. It was a fairly simple way for one to get out the 'special' category of the jounin, simply train a team of genin and you could get a fairly easy promotion to jounin. Of course, Anko hated all the little bastards; she had actually only taken part of various chuunin exams because she liked watching them die bloody deaths.

Now here she was, on her way towards the instructor for Hinata to get Kurenai to pass the girl off to her.

Anko shook her head, bemused. Well, it was an easy way to get her mind off things like the lack of missions at her disposal. Actually, with an apprentice, she'd be able to pass under the radar of those pissy bastards on the council and get missions. Granted, they would be lower level missions then she would have liked, mostly C, maybe a B mission if she was lucky. The reason behind this was because she wouldn't actually be getting one for herself, but rather for her 'team'. Ninja could _not_ take any vacation time while a team was under their control. There were several reasons for this rule, one was that it was just good common sense for a team to stick together. Another was that there had been multiple mishaps because some idiot shinobi had tried taking their off time and had left their team at a major disadvantage, which more often then not resulted in the deaths of many ninja.

The only way the council would be able to stop her activities would be to directly remove her from active duty. But that would likely cause the whole situation to be brought under a lot of unwanted attention, and Anko knew that the old bastards wanted to keep their damn prejudices hidden.

In other words, it was the perfect plan. Well, so long as she could get Hinata's instructor to agree, but Anko had a few cards up her sleeve in case Kurenai wasn't cooperative.

"Yuuhi!" Anko finally found the jounin. She knew that she was quite lucky in this regard, practically all the ninja in Konoha were constantly getting long term missions, 'besides me' Anko thought bitterly, so it was quite difficult to get a chance to talk to any specific shinobi.

"Mitarashi?" The red-eyed woman blinked slightly as she halted and glanced at Anko. "Is there something you need, I just got back from a three-day mission, and I need to give my report." Kurenai's voice was laced with fatigue and irritation, 'Perfect' thought Anko sinisterly.

"Mmm…" Anko tilted her head and placed a finger on her cheek, "Yes… there was something I needed to ask you," Anko leaned forward in a gossipy way, "I'd rather it be private though." Wouldn't want anyone to interrupt. Kurenai nodded warily, and both she and Anko moved into a currently unused office.

"Well," The genjutsu specialist paused, "What is it?" Anko took a moment to sniff the air; a faint odor was coming from the other woman, likely, she hadn't had time to clean herself in the past three days.

"Mmm…" Anko took a moment to gather her thoughts. How to get to the subject… Well, subtly was never Anko's strong suit so… "I want Hinata." The statement was so out of nowhere that Kurenai simply blinked for a few seconds. "What?" Her tone was utterly confused. "I said I want Hinata. As in as my genin." Anko's bluntness caught Kurenai completely off guard. "What… why…? What are you talking about?"

Sighing, Anko leaned against the wall. "I've… taken an interest in the Hyuuga, I want to take her… under my wing, as it were." Anko paused to let this sink in a bit more. "I've noticed that you haven't really be able to give your team all the attention it needs." Actually, Anko was just guessing on this one, but it was a fair assumption. "So, when I saw that the girl wasn't really getting much done without an instructor, I figured I'd take her off your hands."

Kurenai had her brows furrowed in thought; obviously she didn't have the time anymore to give her team the proper guidance it needed. That was true, but… "Why now? Why Hinata?" The question was expected, but Anko still paused in thought. "...She's got… spunk." Half-truths were nice. "She has a tenacity that's quite… interesting." Yes, not the whole reason, but part of it.

Kurenai said nothing for a few minutes, her overtaxed mind going into overdrive as it weighed the pros and cons of the situation. Anko was starting to grow slightly nervous, would she just accept it at that, or would she need to keep badgering her?

"Alright…" Anko held back a sigh of relief, "But only if you take my whole team." Anko bit back a curse. She only wanted Hinata, an apprentice, not a whole frigg'in team of idiots.

"No." Kurenai's surprised look was a treat, "I only want Hinata." Anko wasn't going to back down on this, and she had spent some of the night thinking up reasons for it.

"But…" Anko cut off the red-eyed jounin. "Both Inuzuka Kiba and Aburame Shino are already being instructed in their family styles, by their families." Anko looked away, to make an image of disgruntlement. "Hinata's family isn't giving her any such training, her father is too busy with her cousin and sister. And as her instructor is far too busy with high ranked missions, she's pretty much the only one of her team with nothing to do." Anko could easily see that her argument was swaying Kurenai towards her side, only a matter of persistence now. "With that in mind, I think that Hinata's potential is definitely being wasted as it is." Anko's words caused Kurenai to jerk slightly and Anko blinked, that wasn't the reaction that she had been expecting.

"Alright," This time Anko was the one caught off guard, Kurenai caving so quickly was quite strange. "I'll place Hinata as your subordinate under the condition that you do your very best to bring out Hinata's potential." Ah, that was it; even Kurenai had started to doubt that her Hyuuga genin would be able to get passed her handicaps. When your own hope is waning, but you still care about the student, why wouldn't you want to pass them to a more interested teacher?

"I was going to do that anyway," said Anko with a dismissive air, "You don't need to worry." Damn, victory tasted sweet indeed, almost as good as dango. Not quite of course, but still pretty close.

After a brief farewell and assurance that she would take care of the documentation, Anko left the stinky woman and sashayed towards the assignment office.

'Hey, if I do this quickly, I may be able to grab a few bites of dango before my meeting time with Hinata.' Thought Anko with a blissful sigh, things were looking quite bright today indeed.

---

Dawn had just arrived in the village hidden in the leaves when Hinata awoke from her deep and restful slumber. Her white eyes, so revered among ninjas, flickered open, focusing on the darkness of her room.

Quickly removing herself from the mattress, the heiress slipped out of her sleepwear and pulled on her shinobi clothing. After a nervous glance at the mirror within the darkened bedroom, Hinata slipped out of her room and began to trek out of the Hyuuga estate. While it was normal to eat breakfast with the rest the head family, Hinata was far too nervous to eat anything before her training.

Mitarashi-san had offered to help the heiress, and Hinata was glad for any help that she could get. She didn't want to burden her teammates, who were getting training from their families, or her sensei, who was very busy with the high level missions from Konoha, but she also wanted to become stronger. However, if she truly wanted to grow, she couldn't do it alone. She needed some sort of guidance in her training, someone who could point out all her mistakes and help her rise above them.

Hunching slightly, Hinata buried herself in her bulky jacket before walking out of her home. She had a bit of time before she was supposed to meet the special-jounin, and she hoped that a walk might calm her nerves.

Gazing at the falling sakura blossoms, Hinata's thoughts were idly brought to her crush's crush: Haruno Sakura. From what Hinata heard, the girl had been apprenticed to the Fifth herself, and was training intensively, Hinata envied her. She had focus, she had determination, and she had Naruto. Flushing slightly, Hinata shook away the nasty feelings that sprang up from that train of thought.

While she did envy the girl, she also had a bit of admiration for her. While Hinata hadn't been all that impressed with her performance during the chuunin exam, she had little room to talk, and Hinata could easily see that she was improving herself at a rapid rate if one of the great three would train her personally.

Sighing, Hinata bleakly thought about her own prospects for teachers. While Kurenai-sensei was an excellent teacher, she had little experience in training someone whose style was completely based around a doujutsu/taijutsu mixture, as Kurenai was a genjutsu specialist. Her father had pretty much given up any hope for her when her younger sister Hanabi had defeated her in several short spars. It wasn't that Hanabi was a genius similar to Neji, but she was more determined then Hinata. She didn't hesitant before a blow, didn't flinch when she was struck. She was simply more of a fighter then Hinata.

Hinata noticed idly that she was almost to the training ground, something that came far too quickly for her liking. Hinata held back another depressed sigh when she saw Anko standing in the middle of the area.

'I'm probably late,' Hinata bemoaned silently. 'I don't really want to find out what Mitarashi-san is like when she's angry.'

"Good morning!" The bright greeting caused the great weight on her shoulders to lessen slightly; she might not be in trouble. "G-good morning." Hinata timidly replied to her sparring partner as she halted a short distance away from her.

"Here," Anko chucked an object at Hinata, who fumbled briefly as she barely managed to catch it.

"What's this?" The heiress' voice was laced with curiosity as she examined the item – a scroll.

"It's a reassignment form. If you sign it, you'll officially be my student." Anko's voice was completely even, not giving away the slightest bit of emotion.

"Wha?" Hinata looked at the special-jounin in shock. "What… but…?" The black-haired genin paused, collecting her wits, before glancing at Anko seriously. "What about my team? Kurenai-sensei, Kiba-ku-"

Anko cut Hinata off as a panicked expression began to set in. "All taken care of. I saw Yuuhi a little over an hour ago and she allowed me to take you off her team roster. Both Inuzuka and Shino Aburame are busy being trained by their families. And if you sign that scroll, I can send it through the system and all the paperwork will be complete in a matter of hours."

"Kurenai-sensei did…?" Hinata felt like some had punched her in the gut. Even Kurenai, who had encouraged her so much, was losing interest in her. At times like these, Hinata felt smaller then ever, like an insect. Only, even lower, since Shino had shown how powerful insects could be. How pitiful, weaker then a bug…

"Hey!" Anko's sharp bark startled Hinata out of her looming depression. "She was really reluctant about it at first, but I was able to convince her. It has nothing to do with whether or not she wanted you on her team." Anko paused at the half-truth, "She simply doesn't have time anymore with Konoha in its current situation. So, with me all eager to teach you, and Yuuhi wanting to have you proper trained, I don't think it was that hard of a choice, eh?" Anko grinned at her slight omission.

The words seemed to be getting through to the Hyuuga, but Hinata frowned as some of the dango-obsessed special-jounin's words caught up with her. "You…. want to teach me?" For the first time since Hinata knew the bloodthirsty woman, she looked slightly uncomfortable. "Well, yeah." Anko stopped, delaying by scratching her nose. "I mean, it's been… an interesting experience, teaching you and such." Hinata looked uneasy at the other woman's words.

"But… why?" The heiress licked her suddenly dry lips. "You're so…" Hinata paused as she struggled for the appropriate words. However, after a few moments of silence, Anko spoke up. "What? I'm… funny, amazingly sociable, stunningly gorgeous and utterly deadly… Yes, I know, thanks." Hinata pouted slightly as the jounin let out a small laugh.

"No! That's not what I mean!" The Hyuuga girl stopped, suddenly realizing how her words sounded. "I… I mean, that's not… I mean you are, but…" Anko waved off Hinata's panicked stammers as she grinned at the genin. "I know what you meant. However, a better question might be: Why not?"

"I…" Hinata frowned, and then looked at the woman opposite of her strangely. "I'm… weak. You're strong, why would you want to teach somebody like me?" The heiress ducked her head as her own words battered at her frail ego.

"Hinata," Anko's tone caused the genin to look up again. "No one is born strong. No one is strong at first; I certainly wasn't very good when I was your age. Even the gods and demons so feared in this world were once weak, with power no greater then any mortal child." Hinata stared at Anko, her pale-white eyes wide in wonder.

"Hinata," Anko walked over the girl and hunched so that she was level with her. "I promise, if you become my apprentice, even if I put you through hell to do so, I'll make you strong." Anko's voice was soft, but commanding, and her words resonated deeply within Hinata. At that moment, the Hyuuga heiress would have done anything that the other woman may have asked of her without question.

Never, not in her entire life, had anybody told Hinata anything like that with such certainty. Her world was encompassed by such words as 'such is expected from a Hyuuga heir' or 'if you work hard enough for it, you can achieve anything.' And when those never worked, her betters just seemed to give her up for a failure, frustrated by her lack of progress. She had only dreamed of possibilities in which she would become stronger, and could only look on in envy towards those who had such power within their grasp.

To have someone tell her that she would become stronger, without any question of failure…

Hinata unrolled the scroll and didn't hesitate as she wet her fingers in ink, and then signed her name.

Tentatively, almost proudly, Hinata smiled at her new teacher.

Oddly, when Anko returned it with her own twisted grin, it wasn't frightening as she remembered.

---

_Tsuzuku_

Pre-read by Israfel, and GenocideHeart from The Fanfiction Forum, many, many thanks to both of you for spending on the time going through this (especially you, Izzy).


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